President Trump says the Justice Department told the head of one of the big AI companies to "get ready to go to jail," then plans to pardon "anybody that got within a thousand miles of the Oval Office" on his way out. In his first sit-down since the midterm wipeout, he also said the countries the U.S. protected will repay "any and all costs" of the Iran war and wouldn't say who throttled Ukraine's Starlink.

Asked by 60 Minutes' Ross Douthat why he isn't worried about the doom scenarios AI builders themselves describe, Trump said the risk "can be managed," and then said by whom. "The DOJ. We had a situation where somebody was reported to us to be doing something bad with AI. We called them very strongly and said, 'Get ready to go to jail. Please give your wife a kiss good night.'"

"I can't tell you," Trump said when Douthat asked who it was, adding that the message went on: "Do you like the color orange? ... Go home right now, see your wife and children, give them a kiss good night." Asked whether it was the leader of a major AI company, one of the big ones, Trump answered: "Yeah, okay. One of the big ones." Douthat said the person "totally changed everything" and Trump replied, "Totally. Yes, sir."

"China Has No Guardrails, By The Way"

Trump said he is "an AI bull" because Xi Jinping, who "left here two weeks ago," is "all-in" on what Trump calls "SI," for super intelligence. "If we don't have it, China's going to have it. That would put us at an unbelievable disadvantage," he said, putting China "one year behind us, which is amazing." Asked why he isn't spooked, he said: "So we're racing China, and that makes it worth the risk." Douthat followed up: "Or you just think the risk is not real?" Trump: "I think that the risk is not nearly as real as ... they talk."

On guardrails he said he doesn't mind them on AI safety but "I don't want to put us in a deep second position," and offered that "China has no guardrails, by the way." Douthat pointed out that China has the guardrail of a totalitarian state, where "whatever Xi says goes." Trump: "With me, it's pretty strong, but it's not quite that strong." He said "very brilliant people" are watching every one of the companies.

Data centers, he said, are being made to bring their own power. "Every one of those centers that goes up now under me is building their own electric," he said, and "they're giving the excess electric right now, they're giving it into the old grid that we had," which he called "old, broken."